


A Rant about How Gohan could be better

by OnioSonofGoku



Category: Dragon Ball, Steven Universe - Fandom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-14
Updated: 2020-07-14
Packaged: 2021-03-05 06:13:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25259776
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OnioSonofGoku/pseuds/OnioSonofGoku
Summary: Title says it all. Spoilers for Steven Universe, DBZ, and Charmed.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 4





	A Rant about How Gohan could be better

So, this is basically just a rant about why I think Gohan is a character of massive untapped potential. I’m also going to be comparing him to another cartoon character, Steven Universe for reasons I’ll explain soon.

So, let’s get the big part out of the way. I only recently finished the Steven Universe series, this includes the movie and Steven Universe Future. And after having watched it, I can honestly say that Steven Universe is one of the most powerful characters in animation, not to mention one of the absolutely best written, rivaling a lot of anime characters. He is by far my favorite male lead in any animation.

Why do I bring up Steven and Gohan, two characters from almost entirely different genres of animation? Because these characters have a lot in common, and I mean a lot. Outside the obvious of them both being powerful half-breeds and the first of their kinds with at least one parent that wasn’t a big part of their lives growing up (in person, at least), Gohan and Steven are also very similar in how they were raised, taught, trained, as well as their personalities. They are both pacifists by nature, preferring to try and talk it out before throwing hands, but neither are afraid to fight when they have to.

They both have had issues with controlling their powers, which spike dramatically during times of stress, and they’ve both given in to their darker emotions more than once. They were both heavily coddled before being tossed into the deep end of the pool and not being given to choose sink or swim. Both Steven and Gohan are very intelligent, despite Steven’s somewhat dopey attitude, and both are skilled fighters with powers comparable if not greater than their alien parents, Pink Diamond and Goku respectively, and we get to see both of these characters come into their own in beautiful fashion.

But, this is where the characters break off and it isn’t the characters themselves I have issue with. It’s the writing of DBZ and its later additions of GT and Super.

Now, I wanna point out right now, I love Dragon Ball. It’s one of my favorite anime’s to binge, it and DBZ (Kai because the 90’s anime absolutely and unforgivingly butchered Goku’s character). I can’t complain too heavily about Super because it did give Gohan some fantastic character moments, but, as we all know, DBZ was supposed to be a passing of the torch to Gohan that never happened because people at Akira Toriyama’s studio whined and winged about Gohan being made the main character and DEMANDED that Goku be unjustly given back the spotlight, which is a rant for another time.

I’m mostly going to be talking about how Gohan was handled in DBZ as that’s the series he was supposed to be the main character of. And, honestly, after Cell, he was handled ****badly.**** Gohan had always been a character of emotional instability in the idea that his human and saiyan genes warred with each other, causing his power to shoot up in violent spurts, leaving him horrified at the destruction he can bring to an area if he wasn’t careful, something that Steven also dealt with. This all started at the same time, or at least close to Goku’s first death, leaving him with the character that would eventually become his surrogate father figure, Piccolo, somewhat akin to what Steven deals with with the Crystal Gems.

The difference is that Gohan is constantly tossed around from one violent life-or-death battle to the next and is never given the chance to stop and come to terms with what’s been happening like Steven did until after the Frieza saga and then he only gets about a year to really handle it all. Then three years of training, the Androids, Cell, and then the biggest part of this rant. Both Steven and Gohan at one point in time blame themselves for the deaths of their alien parents. Steven’s birth literally erased Pink Diamond as they couldn’t both exist and Goku sacrificed himself after Gohan made the mistake of torturing Cell instead of killing it. They both had to deal with the backlash of their parents mistakes at one point or another in their lives, Steven having to handle… well, the whole series because Pink was an awful person for a long time.

And Gohan with the Androids and Cell. If you don’t remember, the Androids and Cell literally existed for one reason and one reason only: To kill Goku. And Gohan was the one that had to clean up that mess, just like how Steven cleaned up Pink’s mess.

And this is where I have issues. When Steven learned more about his mother, he began to become paranoid, even angry and resentful of her. Gohan, a child that actually did get to know his alien parent, learned more and more about his father and despite the pain that Goku’s action put him through, felt nothing but pride towards Goku, even accepting Goku’s decision to stay dead at the end of the Cell saga.

I’m sorry, but that’s just even more unbelievable for me than any of the weird shit that happens in Steven Universe and DBZ. And no one is going to convince me that his Saiyan genetics are the reasons for this because Gohan, in temperament is more human than Saiyan, just like Steven, again. And I promise, you can’t just accept the death of a family member like that and it mean nothing to you, not to mention that both boys went through some shit in their respective stories. Steven Universe Future is a series built around Steven handling all the things that came with being him and dealing with the trauma of his childhood, which, in how he handles it before his family helps him in one of the most tear jerking scenes in the whole franchise, emulates PTSD almost exactly.

But Gohan just… accepts it and moves on? I’m sorry, but that is a HUGE missed opportunity for some fantastic character development. When I think of how angry Steven is at his mother in certain points and how angry Gohan should be about his father basically saying ‘Peace, I’m out, take good care of everyone’, I’m reminded of one of the most powerful and emotional scenes I’ve ever seen on TV.

In the TV series Charmed, Season 4, Episode 3: ‘Hell Hath no Fury’, Piper Halliwell is forced to confront her rage and grief towards her elder sister Pruedence after her death. Is it her fault Prue died? Is it Prue’s fault? No, it’s not, but that doesn’t stop her from being angry, even hateful due to the fact that her big sister is gone and that Piper, somewhere in her heart, blames Prue for it, even if it doesn’t make sense.

Is it Goku’s fault he died? No. Is it Gohan’s? No, but he’s a ten year old boy (physically 11) who just watched his father vanish from his life only to find out it was in vain. He then watched that same monster kill one of his friends. He is then wounded protecting an ally and forced to fight one last time. You’re seriously telling me no one on the staff back then said ‘Hey, maybe we should bring it in and explore this a bit, see how Gohan actually feels about this.’? That’s a lot of rage, pain, and trauma that’s simply glossed over and it irks me because it would give Gohan that emotional depth he DESPERATELY NEEDS instead of everyone and their grandmother just shoving him off to the side to see Goku and Vegeta get a new power-up.

That’s not a knock against Vegeta as he’s one of my favorite characters in DBZ for his fantastic character arc, same with Piccolo, but that’s just the point. These characters were given true development with a level of care that Gohan was denied after the Cell Saga.

I’m not saying at all that Gohan is bad, just that he could be much better and Steven is a perfect example of exactly that. He’s a very well written character that honestly seems to be based on Gohan in a lot of ways, meaning that instances where Steven showed ****human**** development, so could Gohan.

In the end, it boils down to differences in writing styles. Steven Universe’s writing style is much more focused on the emotional weight of actions and their consequences. Dragon Ball Z is written to emphasize action and power over emotion and this works for it, obviously. I just wish there was a bit development with some of the issues that I’ve listed here.

I’m not saying at all that I want Gohan to be a basket case (though he should be after all that shit), I just wish he had a bit more depth as a person over depth as a fighter.


End file.
